Dabai Seeds

Buah dabai, buah kebayau or Sibu olive seems to be all Sarawakians favorite fruit, I reckon, everyone talk loud about it once it's in season.

The picture above is the dabais from the freezer, they are wrinkled and not as fresh as new.

Each dabai containing a single seed. The fresh inside the seed I'm told is edible and taste like kuaci. Chop into two with a parang or hack open with a hammer to get the fresh out of the seed. It isn't an easy task though as the seed is as hard as stone!

Being a Chinese, I grew up surrounded by multiethnic races neighbours at Sarikei little town. Although I went to Methodist Anglo Chinese School and had lots of Foochow friends, in the afternoon, I'd sneak out and follow a Malay friend to her Kelas Ugama to learn Arabic at Abang Haji Matahir's School and at weekends follow some Roman Catholic friends to St. Anne's JV and had attended their masses several of times. My childhood's best friend was a Indian girl, they were the only Indian family in Sarikei then, and her dad was an Police Inspector.

Surrounded by multiethnic races I was exposed to many ethnic dialects and foods. We had a Melanau neighbour who taught us how to eat fresh inside the stonehard dabai seeds, a Malay neighbour who taught us how to eat boiled durian and cempedak seeds and a Chinese neighbour who always send us foods offered to idols and I once had an experience killing live eel a neighbour gave us. I can still feel the horrible experience watching the eel wriggling and squirming refuse to die.

Making Tempoyak (Fermented Durian)

Durians that fall during a thunderstorm or heavy downpour are not of the best quality. These are what we have still lying outside the house.

These durians are from Song, a small village somewhere upper river. Selling around RM1-1.5 per durian.

Durian worm.

Mashed durian (tempoyak/fermented durian) ready to be cooked.

Here's how I make durian tempoyak's video :) by the way mind the frog squeaking sound in the background somewhere.

Wild Mango Dish

After had read from a Sabahan's blog on how they cook wild mango (mawang) dish, I gave it a try. Here's my version of mawang with sambal :)

Ingredients:
1 mawang fresh shredded
3 shallot, minced
3 bird's eye chili pepper
1 thumb size belacan, dissolved in 3tbsp hot water
1 handful anchovies

Method:
Heat 3 tbsp cooking oil in a wok, saute shallots, chilies and anchovies until fragrant. Pour in dissolved belacan (shrimp paste) stir well then add in wild mango.

Cook on medium low heat for 3 mins. Serve hot. It does taste like mango dish, delicious over hot rice :)

Mawang

Mawang (Bambangan to the Sabahans), (Mangifera panjang) a type of wild mango with brown skin with a pungent smell stronger than that of kuini (another type of Borneo wild mango). The fruit is found extensively in Borneo island and I was told the fruit is not eaten fresh as a fruit but made into a dish or cooked with fish for a distinctive flavour.

Nevertheless, we have been eating it as fruit as far as I know. The fruit is not famous among urban dwellers, it's another wild fruit that hardly found in the market.

This one was left on my table this morning, I'm guessing it was from the team who visited Song (a small village) upper river yesterday as they've left for Kapit early this morning leaving like about 50 durians outside the house :)

I seriously don't know what to do with this fruit. And had never opened one before.

Here's my first attempt of cutting open a mawang fruit's video:

Paku Pakis

Paku choy, Pao as I remember Vicky mentioned it to me brings back nostalgic every time we have it. When I was the person in-charge of food during one of our Youth Camps in Sarikei many years ago, I was only 16 0r 17, we had this yearly Youth Camp and for the first time I was made a committee member in charge of food for about 40 students.

Well then, as a person in charge, all I need to do was to make sure all 3 meals are provided for everyone throughout the camp. Basically all the meals were catered.

Somehow on one particular day I'd decided to cook wanna impress my crush lah konon. I bought 2 bundles of paku and it was my first time to try my hand on paku dish. I was confident enough, but apparently not until half way suddenly I wasn't sure how to know if it's cooked. It ended up nice though albeit it was a bit overcooked.

I know the Pinoy style, they love the dish raw, I'd tried that once but I find raw fern is a bit sap. I'd love it rather well done :)

Ingredients:
1 bundle of paku (RM1), clean and pick leaves and tender parts of the stalks
2 chillies, shredded
3 clove garlic, minced
1 handful dried shrimp, pounded

1 thumb size shrimp paste
1 tbsp oyster sauce
3 tbsp hot water
(dissolved the above ingredients in the hot water)

Method:
Heat 3 tbsp cooking oil in a wok. Saute minced garlic and dried shrimp (as usual) until fragrant. Add in dissolved ingredients, mix well and pour in paku, stir fry until cooked through (3mins).